Year: 2012

We don’t need no education

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We live in a world governed by education – a small mean god we worship, even without realising our faith. It schools us in the rational mind and teaches us to look at the earth through the heartless and acquisitive eyes of Empire. Depending on what kind of house we are born into we go to school to be shaped by the requirements of our hierarchical culture: to be turned into obedient factory or cannon fodder, to fill in forms, or to arrogantly rule the world. But no matter what school we attend, all of us are programmed to see life in geometric squares, truth as scientific facts, the earth as property, our nation’s history as the rightful conquest of Western civilisation. We are taught that control of the mind is always more important thanl real-life experience.

The Main Street to recaptured capital

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As a former mayor of Santa Cruz, California, I have had a sustained interest in alternative investment strategies for local communities. Most of the proposals I’ve studied and worked on tend to be either unrealistic about the ability of local communities to function outside of the larger capitalist system, or overly optimistic about the likely economic success and impact of alternative community institutions.

Peak Moment 217: Portland’s backyard fruit – from waste to feast

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“We look forward to a time when we’re really able to harvest all of the fruit trees in the city that aren’t being fully utilized,” envisions Katy Kolker, founder and executive director of Portland Fruit Tree Project. Volunteer groups harvest trees whose fruit would otherwise go to waste. Half of the fruit goes to neighborhood food banks, and the remainder goes home with the volunteers….From harvesting 8000 pounds of fruit in 2008 to three times that in 2010, this growing project is bearing fruit and benefitting thousands.

Social Innovations for Economic Degrowth

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At the beginning of the twenty-first century, we find ourselves in a peculiar situation: although hardly anyone would deny the deep ecological crisis facing humankind, we seem to be caught in a net of assumptions that impede a practical solution. Having acknowledged that we need to reduce consumption of energy and materials drastically, we still often think that adjustments within the current system of production and consumption will accomplish this formidable task…At the same time, it is widely recognized that the results of the dominant approaches to solving the ecological crisis are far from satisfying. Degrowth obviously entails a fundamental transformation of economic structures. But what precisely are the necessary steps?

The weather may not be the problem

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Weather-related contrasts are occurring here in my own Ohio backyard where it barely rained at all from May to August. Close to our farm stand two cornfields just across a narrow road from each other. One has nearly normal corn and the other (in one of the photos) has drought-stricken corn. I know personally both farmers who planted these two fields and both are very competent. The soil in both fields is the same. Fertilizer applied was about the same. Rainfall was the same. This contrast appears all over the county, all over the state, all over the Corn Belt. What is going on here?

Obols or No Balls

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While policy-makers struggle to increase the flow of money in stagnant national economies they fail to see that it is not the quantity of the money that is the problem but its quality. The imperialist currencies of dollar and euro were designed to serve the interests of elites, so we should not be surprised that they do nothing to support the livelihoods of citizens of countries the world over. In The Ecology of Money, Richard Douthwaite suggested a sophisticated multi-layered currency world, where different types of money played different roles. Although ignored at the time, this may be just the sort of proposal we need now to resolve the crisis in the global economy, and particularly the crisis in the Eurozone.

Urban Minds

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In Extraenvironmentalist #48 we speak with archeologist Paul Sinclair about the Urban Mind project. Paul discusses a new field of archeological research that is discovering the role of urban gardening throughout history and during wartime in ancient cities…Donnie Maclurcan of the Post Growth Institute tells us how we can start building a post-growth world…Last of all, John Michael Greer joins us to answer listener questions and to talk about David Korowicz’s FEASTA study, Trade Off: A Study in Global Systemic Collapse.

Great Real Food

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They say, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. Well, our food system is broken, and it does need fixing…fast. The cogs of the 21st century global food system turn, but are in need of (sustainable) oiling to help transition smoothly towards a viable and secure food future. The Real Food Store in Exeter, Devon, is helping to unstick some of the global food system problems at a local level.

Shale gas – Aug 29

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-Drilling permits decline sharply for the Pennsylvania Marcellus formation
-University of Texas Compounds Conflict Question in Review of Gas Report
-Fracking Hazards Obscured In Failure To Disclose Wells
-Natural Gas and Its Role In the U.S.’s Energy Endgame
-Destroying Precious Land for Gas
-Fracking is too important to foul up
-Shale gas failure offers rescue for EU green energy drive